The disgraced official I took care of was actually Zhu Houcong's childhood friend.

Chapter 230

"Lord Zhou, aren't you exaggerating a bit too much? We simply want a reason. Is there no place in our Great Ming Dynasty where reason prevails?"

Another old man, who looked very old and frail, said.

"Who the hell do you think you are?"

This time, Zhou Chu didn't speak, but instead gave Lin Lu a wink. Lin Lu had been following Zhou Chu for so long that she understood what he meant with just a glance. She immediately stepped forward, pointed at the old man's nose, and said without any politeness.

"You! You! You! You've disgraced culture! You've disgraced culture!"

The old man was so angered by Lin Lu's retort that he almost couldn't catch his breath. After a long while, he could only manage to utter these two sentences.

"Excuse me, we are Jinyiwei (Imperial Guards), not scholars or civil officials. We haven't read many books, so it's really not appropriate for us to talk about civility."

Zhou Chu scoffed.

"you!"

The old man trembled with anger upon hearing this.

"What do you mean, 'you'? At your age, instead of staying home and waiting to die, you come out and embarrass yourself."

Lin Lu had just finished venting her anger, and now that she finally had a chance to express herself freely, how could she let it go?

Put aside your personal qualities and enjoy a life of immorality.

Lin Lu suddenly remembered these two sentences that her elders often said. At this moment, Lin Lu felt as if she had been enlightened and suddenly understood the meaning of these two sentences.

"I!"

The old man was speechless after being confronted by Lin Lu, his hands trembling as if he were about to die there at any moment.

In the end, the Zhang brothers and these old men, who had arrived so arrogantly, left in disgrace.

Even those wealthy men who relied on their age and status were scolded by Zhou Chu until their faces turned ashen.

The main problem is that Zhou Chu is fearless and speaks without restraint, uttering all sorts of vulgar and offensive language. These old men have never seen such a reckless person before. Most importantly, they have no way to turn against Zhou Chu.

If they dared to turn against him or overturn the table, Zhou Chu's men would have suppressed them on the spot, saving them the trouble of further investigation.

As the saying goes, a weak nation has no diplomacy, and this still applies to the current situation. Zhou Chu holds military power and controls the Embroidered Uniform Guard. No matter how harsh Zhou Chu's insults are, they can only endure them and have no way to break off relations.

In this situation, they were naturally at a disadvantage. It was a mistake for them to seek reason with Zhou Chu. They mistook Zhou Chu for one of those pedantic scholars and thought they could trick him.

He came full of confidence, but when he left, he felt like he wanted to die. After all, he was so old and had served as an official in the court. He was highly respected and virtuous. How could he stand being scolded like that?

On average, each county in the Ming Dynasty had about 400,000 mu of arable land, but this was just an average. The situation varied from county to county, and poor counties in mountainous areas naturally had much less arable land.

Although Huating County is entirely plains and is considered a wealthy county, its overall area is not very large, only about 700,000 mu, and its arable land is only about 400,000 to 500,000 mu.

However, the land that was annexed by those gentry and officials amounted to more than 300,000 mu, while all other people only owned a few hundred thousand mu of arable land.

The situation is undeniably serious.

The families that annexed the most were none other than the families of the old men who came with the Zhang brothers, Zhang Heling and Zhang Heling. They basically completed the annexation when the brothers entered the court to serve as officials.

These people's families have annexed anywhere from 50,000 to 60,000 mu of farmland to 20,000 to 30,000 mu.

Moreover, according to Liu Damo's booklet, these families had the most hidden land, and the proportion of land they had under-measured was also the highest.

Originally, this was not a big deal for them, and they even took it for granted. They regarded the entire Huating County as their backyard and took whatever they wanted, until Zhou Chu wanted to survey the land, and they were suddenly awakened.

In the entire Huating County, the land officially recorded in the Fish Scale Atlas is only over 300,000 mu, meaning that over 100,000 mu of land has been hidden.